20 Rumors About Madara
by ellemarchen
Summary: There've always been rumors surrounding Madara. Whether they were true or not is another matter entirely.


Fandom: Naruto  
Title: 20 Rumors About Madara  
Author: hana-akira AKA rurichi  
Character: Uchiha Madara  
Genre: General  
Rating: 17+  
Warning: OOC, doesn't-really-follow-canon, sort-of-timetravel-but-not-really  
Prompt: Rumors, facts, and rumors based on facts.  
Summary: There've always been rumors surrounding Madara. Whether they were true or not is another matter entirely.

—

1. Uchiha Madara doesn't have a most precious person. At least, not anymore.

Once upon a time, it had been Uchiha Izuna. This is not so much as a rumor as it was a fact.

Uchiha Madara was Uchiha Izuna's older brother. When they were children, Madara had always made sure that he was there for Izuna. Playtime, naptime, snack time, story time—he was there for them all. When they grew older, he always made sure that he went with Izuna into battle.

Madara would have lived and died for Izuna. He would have bled and he would have cried if it meant that Izuna would be happy. He killed, he protected, he saved for Izuna. He even gained the Mangekyou Sharingan for him. He did all of this simply because Uchiha Izuna was his _most precious person_.

But then, Uchiha Izuna had started to love the clan more than he loved Madara and he wasn't the person Madara could consider precious anymore. Because Madara couldn't _wouldn't_ consider someone his most precious person unless they returned the favor.

Izuna hadn't and so Madara didn't have a most precious person anymore. It was because of this that Madara had suddenly started his suicide by overuse of the Mangekyou Sharingan. Later on, Izuna will force his eyes in Madara's eye sockets and will wonder in his last moments why his older brother had adamantly refused to accept his eyes. Afterwards, a multitude of people will try to become Madara's next most precious person and will fail miserably for numerous reasons:

Senju Hashirama will fail because he considered Konohagakure more important than Madara. He will fail and it will hurt him as he dies for Konoha because he knows that he wants both Konoha and Madara to be his.

Pein will fail because he considered peace more important than Madara. He will fail and it will hurt him as he dies for his dream because he could imagine what a world of peace with Madara by his side would have been like.

Uchiha Itachi will fail because he considered his little brother more important than Madara. He will fail and it will hurt him as he dies for his family because he could see what his future could have been like if he had only listened to Madara's advice of leaving both Konoha and the Uchiha Clan behind.

_(_Zetsu, Deidara, Yagura, Namikaze Minato, Uchiha Sasuke—_)_

They will **all** fail because _everyone_ falls short according to Madara's standard.

Uchiha Madara does not have a most precious person and it hurts a lot of people to admit that.

—

2. Despite being part of the Uchiha Clan, Uchiha Madara's inherent element had actually been wind, not fire.

It was because of this that he had used a battle fan as one of his main weapons besides his kusarigama(1) during the times of the Clan Wars.

Of course, he was able to use the other elemental natured chakra; he was an Uchiha after all. But the element that he was _born_ with, the element that he had an affinity for—it had been wind. Wind wasn't a substantial object like the other elements; it could never be grasped and so it could only be nothing. It was only a wisp, a ghost. It was everywhere and nowhere and it had traveled all the corners of the world— from the seas to the forests to the mountains to the deserts. The wind was a force to be reckoned with just like the other forces of nature, but only if it WANTED to be. It was always moving at its own pace, never stopping for anyone else.

(Madara thinks it's fitting because the wind describes him in a way nothing else ever could.)

People who knew him though, or had at least made an acquaintance, think it's ironic. After all, everything about him that they knew wasn't _anything_ like wind nature. _Fire_ nature suited him more, in their opinion.

(Senju Tobirama especially thought this since he had first seen Uchiha Madara's eyes, with and without the Sharingan.)

There's something about them that draws people in, whether they wanted to be or not. It was hypnotizing and enthralling, really, when Tobirama thinks about it. The Sharingan _blazed_ when Madara activated it. It **blazed** and it roared and it would catch your attention no matter what you were doing at the time. And even without the Sharingan, Madara's eyes gleamed with a brilliant radiance of something akin to black fire. A whirlpool of black fire that would _burn_ and **continue** to _burn_ until there was nothing left to burn. It was dangerous to look into Madara's eyes for even one moment because once you _looked_, the eyes would swallow you whole, whether they were just the natural black eyes of the Uchiha or their infamous Doujutsu.

Senju Tobirama thinks Uchiha Madara's eyes are like the sun, a great big ball of fire, and cannot see how Madara's chakra affinity could **ever** be wind. Because although wind was a powerful chakra nature, it could _never_ describe Madara in his opinion.

Wind would never be noticed unless it was a tornado or it was used with brute force and precision. But fire? **Fire** was always noticed. Even a match could catch someone's attention and Madara did that alone with just his eyes.

(Senju Hashirama also thought this, although he had a different reason as to why he thought so.)

It was the way Madara _held_ himself and how he _fought_ that made Hashirama believe Madara was fire reincarnated.

Madara held himself as though he had a _purpose_—that everything he did had a reason, even if it was one that didn't make any sense to anyone but himself. His poise, his stance—he wasn't like the wind that was just there. He was more like fire; fire which burned and smoldered because it _could_. Fire which burned for no other reason than the reason that it was just able to _burn_. And the way he fought—the way Madara fought was like a wildfire; it engulfed everything and anything and **it never stopped** until there was nothing else to burn and all that was left was ashes and smoke.

Madara was fire; with smoky eyes and hair as dark as coal. Madara _could_ be wind; after all, he had both brute force AND precision in spades, but fire was what _suited_ Madara more, in Hashirama's mind. Wind was gentle at its best, with its tender breezes and soft caresses while fire could only be seen from a distance in order to appreciate its worth. If one got too close to fire, it would lick at the skin and _burn_.

And how that fire **burned**.

—

3. The person that Uchiha Madara admires the most is Senju Hashirama(2).

The reason for this isn't because Hashirama was the greatest ninja of his time or anything like that, though it could be counted for bonus points. Power was easy to get once you knew what to look for, and hard work was just as easy to do once you got into a routine of sorts. No, the reason why Madara admires Hashirama was much simpler and ordinary than one would think. Madara had admired Hashirama for mainly one thing: efficiency.

Efficiency to lead a clan as the clan leader. Efficiency to wield the Mokuton element. Efficiency to act as a diplomat. Efficiency to take responsibility of others. Efficiency to fight as a soldier. Efficiency to care for his family. **Efficiency**.

You couldn't be born with efficiency: there was just _no way_ you could be born with it. Efficiency had to be cultivated; it had to be _refined_. You could be efficient in understanding the information about jutsu, but that didn't mean you could _perform_ it. You could be efficient in everything, but that didn't mean you could actually _understand_ it. Even if you were a genius and you were good at what you did, who's to say if you were any good at everything else?

Hashirama was efficient in everything he did, to a point. After all, a human could never be perfect no matter how much they practiced. It just wasn't done. But Madara could appreciate the time and effort Hashirama put into becoming an efficient person.

(It's also said that Senju Hashirama was the only person Madara has ever admitted out loud to have admired.)

4. Coincidentally, the person that Madara hates the most is also Senju Hashirama(3).

Of course, Madara hates a lot of other people: Daimyos, liars, rapists, child molesters, scientists, anything that was stronger than him—he hates them all. It's just that he hates Hashirama the most out of the whole lot.

(Madara hadn't actually hated Hashirama at first. In fact, Madara hadn't even _known_ who Hashirama really was until they met face-to-face and even then, he only acknowledged Hashirama as simply his opponent.)

It was when they had exchanged blows that Madara began to hate Hashirama.

They had fought for awhile, long enough that both participants were tired yet still held strong to not be knocked down. Fire and wood, roots rising and trees burning, and the air filled with choking smoke. Madara had let down his guard for a moment and then—

Hashirama was suddenly at his back, too close, and before Madara could even _think_, Madara had stabbed Hashirama in the chest.

The battle had abruptly ended, with Madara looking like a ghost, running for his life—not once looking back.

Madara hates losing, but more than anything else, Madara hates losing control because losing control meant you felt _fear_. Madara will never be able to look Hashirama in the eye because Hashirama, with simply just his presence alone, brings that feeling of fear out of Madara in spades.

Madara knows that if Hashirama actually _fought_ seriously against him for once, he will die.

(It takes all of Madara's willpower to not run as Hashirama stares at him with intense dark brown eyes each and every time they meet again.)

Senju Hashirama makes him feel fear and Madara hates him for it.

—

5. Madara's favorite color is orange.

The affection for this color actually started when he was going blind due to the Mangekyou Sharingan. During that time, everything dimmed; thus, everything became dull. He soon grew to be fond of bright colors (Particularly the ones that were neon-colored) and found, to his surprise and delight, a favorite among them.

(It should be noted, that before he gained the Mangekyou Sharingan, Madara didn't actually have a favorite color. In fact, he didn't even _care_ about color then, since it was something that was just **there**. Still, a lot of things get thrown into perspective when you start to lose the things you've taken for granted.)

Orange, he found, was his absolute favorite. The vibrancy of the color, the literal _zest_ of it, brought a sense of comfort to him. Orange never failed to catch his attention and he was thankful for it.

His soft spot for this color was the actual reason why he joined Pein in the first place and was also the same reason why he hadn't killed Uzumaki Naruto immediately. It's also the reason why he wore the orange mask even though it literally screamed 'Kill me!' (Not that anyone would've been able to kill him even if he had worn a full bodysuit of that color. He was a ninja, and if you didn't die in the first ten years of your career, you were probably not going to die any time soon unless you did something incredibly stupid, or something incredibly heroic and noble. Madara planned to do neither of these.)

There's something dangerous about that color, something that screamed, "Look at me."

Madara looks, and he's not at all disappointed at what he sees (He had met the Kyuubi, fate and nature's incarnate, and its whole body was orange. He had also met a younger cousin by the name of Obito who-knows-who-was-however-times-removed who had worn orange goggles, although the boy had died doing what he believed in. And he had met Uzumaki Naruto, a man, who in his younger years, was known as the 'Orange Bombshell', both literally and figuratively.)

(Unbeknownst to anyone else except for the Kyuubi itself, it was also the reason why, out of all the Bijuu, Madara had chosen to take control of the Kyuubi.)

The Kyuubi had NOT been amused once it understood why Madara had chosen him out of all the others.

—

6. His favorite food is inarizushi(4).

He also likes dango, but his most favorite is inarizushi. It's simple to make, simple enough that even beginner chefs could make it, and has even been known to be one of the simplest sushi to make out there (Since, well, it's just fried tofu stuffed with rice in it, though, occasionally some vegetables are added in it, too.) It has also been known to be called _kitsune-zushi_ due to the fact that worshippers of Inari offer it at her shrines.

The reason for his liking of inarizushi is due to its taste. It's sweet, though not as sweet as dango can be at times, but lightly sweet, a taste that Madara can't help but like. It's moist and soft, and therefore, easy to eat. It also doesn't hurt that he can save time when eating it, since it usually only takes him one bite to finish it off.

It could also be that he secretly likes the shape of the inarizushi since it reminds him of a little boat made of gold or the strange currency he saw once in his travels, but he'll never admit that.

—

7. His least favorite food is roe(5).

Madara hates roe for more than one reason. Countless ones, actually, but who's counting?

Roe, also known as _ikura_, is the fully ripe internal ovaries of fish and certain marine animals. It's crunchy, cold, and it makes a crisp 'popping' sound once you bite onto it. The faintly salty, slightly fishy taste of it also doesn't help.

The fact that it was also known as "caviar" and could be quite expensive depending on its handling before it was served also made Madara dislike it more (He was a cheap bastard and he liked cheap things. The roe, if it was good, would cost him more than thirty kunai and that was considered A LOT since it was during the time of the Clan Wars. Sometimes, it would even cost some people their first-born child.)

Izuna had asked him once why he hated eating it, besides the obvious reasons for his revulsion of the dish.

Madara's reply? "I already have one tale where I'm said to eat babies: I don't need to make it a fact."

(The tale was actually an extremely exaggerated speculation of an incident involving Madara and a human baby: supposedly, a man of an opposing clan saw Madara carry a dead baby that was NOT an Uchiha off the battleground of a skirmish that had just ended. Said man assumed that Madara was going to eat the baby since he couldn't come up with any reason why Madara would carry it and so he spread a tale of Madara eating said baby. In actuality, Madara was going to bury the baby since a dying grandmother asked him to. He did this for two reasons: 1. You never deny a dying person their wish unless it's impossible because you might actually meet said dying person in the afterlife who will then mob you. 2. Because it was pitiful to see something born and then die soon after its birth without being properly buried.)

—

8. A hobby of his is falconry(6).

Long ago, before the Clan Wars had even begun to take root, Madara had been a child who had an infinite curiosity of everything around him, and a fascination to match it to boot. It was only a matter of time that he would have been curious and fascinated by something that would eventually lead him to taking up this hobby.

He had found an injured falcon, its right wing twisted in an awkward bent, and couldn't help but try to help it since he was still an innocent child who couldn't stand the sight of something living dying before him. It had recovered, miraculously, and had taken a shine to him, letting itself be tamed by him with soothing words and gentle gestures.

Madara could remember the exuberant and absolute joy he had felt from just watching the falcon fly and return back to him from just a whistle from his lips. It was exhilarating and exciting in his opinion to just see and bask in the beauty of it all. To see the flight and the wingspan of the falcons he had tamed… it felt glorious.

(Later, he had other falcons, and eventually, it became a hobby; something that relaxed and had soothed him at the same time.)

—

9. His birthday is on December 24(7).

Again, this is not so much as a rumor as it is a fact. However, the rumor that IS surrounding this fact is that Madara hates his birthday.

There were many reasons speculated for why Madara hated his birthday. Hashirama had thought that since it was in the last month in the year, it was pretty late to get gifts compared to everyone else's birthday which were mostly in the months before (During the time before Clan Wars, it was rare for children to be born in the more harsher and colder months, even more extraordinarily rare for a child to be born in the first month of winter.) Tobirama had thought more crudely that it was because Madara hated such cold-ass weather and that he couldn't stand something that was the almost exact opposite of the Uchiha's inherent element. Izuna actually didn't know what to think since Madara hadn't actually hated his birthday until the Clan Wars had started.

(Izuna is the closest one to the truth, though he only has it half right.)

Madara _had_ actually only started to hate his birthday after the Clan Wars started, but the reason wasn't what either Hashirama or Tobirama had thought. He started to hate his birthday because there was no party for him and that his 'Christmas' presents became his 'Birthday' presents due to the war effort his clan had to put into. No cake, though there was Christmas dessert. The Christmas party became his 'Birthday' party—the day when he was born wasn't about him anymore: it was about other people's _happiness_, other people's _joy_. Not _his_.

(It hurt to know that the reason people were celebrating wasn't because of you, wasn't because of the fact that you were born, and wasn't because of the fact that you were **alive**. It was for themselves, and Madara couldn't help but hate it.)

—

10. Madara hates fire.

Madara hates fire because he remembers being burned alive. He remembers the right side of his face had been burned, once, his right eye to be exact. It had burned, crinkled, and had become hot, even hotter than a piece of coal he had picked up once after it had been burned by a campfire during winter.

(His eye had felt like it was melting, like wax, except much faster. Skin was peeling and the taste of ashes were in his mouth.)

Another member of his family had burned him alive with black fire.

(It had been a failsafe of Itachi's, something he had put in Sasuke before he had offed himself finally.)

_Amaterasu_(8), the fire had been called, ironically being named after the Sun Goddess when it wasn't like the sun or the Goddess at all except for its extreme heat and acute pain that it brought.

(They say she was born from the left eye of Izanagi. Madara wonders if this is an omen—and if Itachi had planned all along to burn him as though he was a witch tied to a tree, a fire lit beneath her feet.)

He hates fire and it is all Itachi's fault.

—

11. He could care less about power.

So _what_ if you had power? So _what_ if you could kill a whole army of soldiers with just a sweep of your hands? So _what_? If you didn't know how to use it, what _good_ was it?

What good was power if you could never use it? What good was power if it never saves you? (Madara had seen many people die, both his clan and strangers, because of power.)

And how would you measure power? How would you put it on a scale? The only real way to measure power was the impact it would have years later, on others when you were long gone (But by then, it wouldn't really matter because most people would be dead and the dead shouldn't have any business with the living.)

Although it was rumored that Madara was a power-hungry bastard, the truth was, was that he really could care less about power.

(He had decided long ago that power was the root of all his problems, and that ultimately, it was useless. If it wasn't part of the solution, which it certainly _wasn't_ when dealing with the war, it was definitely part of the problem.)

It was nice to look at power (The Bijuu being prime examples), but it just wasn't worth it to waste one's time and life on it.

(The seas drown. The earth quakes. Tornadoes and hurricanes literally take your breath away. And the volcanoes erupt and swallow everything, leaving nothing but a charred and black land.)

—

12. He has a lower opinion of women than men.

He could never really understand why women should be treated as though they were royalty—something to be cherished and loved. He never saw the appeal in coddling them and didn't understand why other men would. The only difference he saw between the two sexes was that one could give birth while the other could not.

(Not that it brought his respect for them up at all. Madara knew that some women had killed their own unborn children in order to save their own hides. He never understood why they would do that—after all, if you didn't want to have a kid, why did you have sex in the first place? Even if you were raped, which, in Madara's opinion was highly unlikely because really, wouldn't you have fought or died trying if you were about to get raped?—it still didn't really make a difference.)

Neither gender was really better than the other generally: both could be just as good and just as bad as the other, but most of the time, Madara thought women were the greater evil of the two.

After all, women were given the choice to give life while men weren't, and they STILL chose to pick death. It said a lot about the character of a person.

(It's harder to build than it is to destroy. If you took the easy way out, what was the point?)

—

13. He never really felt insulted when someone said he was weak.

Madara was only human, after all. It's not like he was a force of nature or an unnatural phenomenon. It was okay to admit that one had a weak spot than to admit one was only average in everything (Jack of All Trades, Master of None, so the saying goes.)

(And even nature had weak spots; mountains would slowly wear away with time, earthquakes would only happen if the ground shifted, the only times there was a tidal wave was when the moon said so, volcanoes became dormant after it had spit out enough of the lava that had been stuck in it, and the wind only decided to blow everything away if it felt like it.)

Many people, from his time and others, had said he was weak.

He had only been amused and had simply asked every time, "Can you honestly say that I'm weak with a straight face to me?"

Collectively, to this date, no one can.

—

14. Madara can find a use for **everything**.

From everyday items to everything else, Madara could find a use for every single last one of them.

(Madara had once killed a man with his pillow. He killed another man by shoving a bar of soap down the man's throat.)

His enemies quickly learned to not disturb his beauty sleep or his relaxed moments unless they wanted a live demonstration of death by household items (After all, it was embarrassing to get killed by an object that wasn't made to kill you in the first place. The Nara, especially, remembered the death by Shogi Pieces Incident, and neither any of the Yamanaka nor the Aburame could look Madara in the eyes after the Cherry Blossom Festival Debacle.)

A button, a hairpin, a lampshade—Madara could use all of these in order to kill his opponents. He could also be quite vicious when he wanted to be with what he used if he was in the mood for it.

(He had once poured a whole bottle of nail polish remover in a Byakugan-user's eyes, and then a whole bottle of nail polish into the same woman's throat.)

Any tool, when held correctly, could be a weapon. Therefore, everything was a weapon and was thus useful.

Madara could find a use for everything, even if it wasn't the item's original purpose to be used in such a way. This skill of his is the main reason why so many had feared him even before the Clan Wars had started.

(You had to fear a man who could use just a slip of paper to slit your throat and a spoon to literally make you blind. The fact that Madara, when he was in childhood years, had once also killed one of his kidnappers with his nail clipper when he was clipping his nails and then another one with a planter that was conveniently nearby, had been an omen and was also a bit disturbing when one took the circumstance and situation into account.)

—

15. He had never wanted to become the Uchiha Clan leader or the Hokage or even a part of _Konoha_.

He could never see the appeal of leading others, of leading _people_. People grew dissatisfied easily, and usually turned to violent measures if their problems weren't fixed fast enough. Either that, or they became docile like domestic dogs.

(The Inuzuka were a stellar example of this. Before, they could automatically become a berserker at the drop of a hat and they never even needed a companion to help them with it. The dogs that accompanied them were just there to be _guides_, not allies where you eventually had to rely heavily on them in order to fight. The generation now compared to then was a horrible pale comparison, exactly that of a candle to a wildfire.)

To be a leader, it meant you had **responsibilities**, that you had **duties**. You had to put others before yourself and everything that is you. It is the people, never the individual, that are the first priority.

(Even if the Sandaime Hokage had let his student go when by all means he should have slit his student's throat or at least have arrested his student, at least he wasn't like the Yondaime Hokage who gave his son to the village like a lamb to the altar. You had to cringe and be disgusted with a man who would be willing to doom his only son in order to make others happy, like a worshipper offering a sacrifice to his God. Both the Shodaime and Nidaime later gave their lives to the village, leaving their family behind to mourn and bury them.)

Madara's not really sure where the idea of him wanting to be Hokage even _came_ from, fairly sure that he doesn't even _want_ to know, and just knows he had never truly wanted to be a part of any institution.

(Konoha would be just like the Uchiha Clan: the people would just have different hair color and eyes, different voices and names. But in the end, they're just people— nothing more, nothing less.)

—

16. He usually likes to hear and read about legends.

His liking for them is one of the reasons why he keeps the story of the Rikudou Sennin intact, despite its dubious origins.

(The myth of one man, supposedly the Shinobi forefather who created ninjutsu single-handedly and was also known to have had the Rinnegan. He was "The Sage of the Six Paths" and he apparently was able to seal away the Juubi into the moon, after having splitting it into nine parts. The man was a priest of the Ninshu who had tried to bring peace to an otherwise war-torn world.

The tale is so far-fetched, but it had such a nice idealistic feel to it that Madara didn't mind the story much. And anyway, every belief needed a figurehead that was _out-of-this-world_ and the Rikudou Sennin was just **that**, if not more.)

It's also the reason why he was reluctant to kill Uzumaki Naruto due to the fact that the child was actually named after a character in a book he had read.

(The boy's father, on the other hand, he could've done without ever knowing. The "Yellow Flash" may have been a hero in Konoha, but he sure as hell _wasn't_ in Iwa. The devastation and absolute _ruin_ that man had brought to the rocky place was enough for Madara to want to steer clear of the man for a century at least.)

People like Jiraiya, however, who wrote about legends or told them, didn't interest him much, if at all. They were just the people who had the _thoughts_ of idealism, not the actions. They hesitated when they shouldn't have questioned themselves at all, and never took matters in their own hands when they should have. Their characters were unimpressive, and truth be told, should be resented in Madara's point of view because it was these sort of people who never stood for what they believed in until it was too late and things couldn't be changed.

—

17. He considers betrayal as the cruelest action a being could do to another.

The notion of this was due to his fallout with his little brother. His younger brother, Izuna, had actually been the one person he had trusted above all others, mainly due to his belief that Izuna would never intentionally hurt him.

That idea quickly went down the drain when the Clan Wars came around (Izuna had betrayed him, had deceived and deserted him, and had chosen the _clan_ instead of him.)

Betrayal, Madara had decided then, was a bittersweet affair. One filled with disappointment and hope, of unfaithfulness and deception.

(He still hasn't forgiven Izuna for doing that to him, for giving him that one sliver of hope that maybe, just maybe, trusting another would be worth it and it wouldn't end up becoming a twisted backstabbing and front-stabbing game. Then again, everything had been a game. It's just that one was more cruel than the other as you grew older.)

One being could rape another, could break their heart, or even kill them, but betrayal of trust between two who were dear to each other was the worst.

(It's harder to live than to die, after all. You had to live with the fact that the one who didn't take your trust seriously was still alive. No love is lost between a victim and a criminal and hearts could be repaired with a new love if the circumstances were right. One could argue against this, but this is Madara's truth. Platonic love was, after all, very different from romance and strangers.)

A betrayal was a broken promise, a pledge that had been given to the wrong receiver.

—

18. Madara is a misanthrope.

He hates humankind. He hates their lies, their actions, their beliefs, their backstabbing of each other, their mistakes, their sinful _nature_.

(Their oblivious _innocence_.)

Really, he could hate them all. He didn't hate the Akatsuki, though.

Pein had been a god. Konan was an angel. Zetsu, in actuality, was more plant than man. Kisame was a shark. Both Hidan and Kakuzu were immortals. Sasori was a puppet. Only Itachi, Orochimaru, and Deidara had been human and even then, they were considered to be terrorists to humankind. So no, he didn't really dislike the Akatsuki until the matter became personal.

(Itachi had tried to kill him. Orochimaru had been a scientist and tried to play with things that he had no right to play with at all.)

Madara was a hater of humankind even if he was a human himself and lived among them.

(To err is human, but to continue to do so is devilish.)

—

19. Madara loves to travel.

Traveling was fun to do, and surprisingly, relaxing. The different people, the different scenery—_everything_ was like a breath of fresh air to him. It was new and it was unlike anything he had ever encountered before. The scenery always changed, from one extreme to another.

(The desert, for one, had always been changing; sand was always constantly shifting and it was a treat to see it every time. The water in the oceans was always rippling, waving back and forth on the coasts of sandy beaches. Forests always seemed to tower over him and mountains were always rough and harsh like the sun.

He also found out that the people of these lands were reflected in the people themselves. It was lovely to see the trees of a warm summer in Hashirama and the icy, deep waters of a bitter winter in Tobirama.)

But most of all, he loves how no one knows him.

(He revels in it. The anonymity, the ambiguity, _the secrecy of it all_. It was like finding the secret to the meaning of life or to immortality.)

Yes, Madara loved to travel, even if he was traveling alone.

—

20. He was a self-conscious kind of person.

Madara didn't seem like the type of person to let others get the best of him, but it happened from time to time. It just didn't happen in the normal roundabout-route kind of way.

(Rumor had it that he watched the things he ate in order to make sure he never gained any weight. Not many people put much stock into this rumor, though, because he never seemed like one to care about his appearance. His hair was wild and he came from a clan where their eyes could turn red any time.

What no one knows is that Madara had done this when he was younger so then Izuna would always see him physically as the same person, even when they grew older.)

On their first meeting, Senju Tobirama had accidentally let it slip that he thought Madara was a freak.

(He had said this to cover his feelings of uneasiness and shock of seeing a sight like Madara. Even when Madara had been just a fledgling—_changeling_ some had whispered more nastily—child, one could tell right away that Madara was different.

Tobirama hadn't actually meant to say that word, but it was hard to know what to say when so many thoughts bombarded you at once on only one subject.)

Senju Tobirama's words had _hurt_. It was one thing to think you were a freak: it was quite another thing **altogether** to hear it from _somebody else_. Madara later donned a mask and cut his hair and even took on a new name so no one would ever remember him, thereby erasing at least his physical existence from the scrolls of history.

(It was only later, when he finally came to accept himself at the end, that he took his mask off out of his own free will, declaring to the world—)

"_Watashi wa Madara."(9)_

—

A/N: Madara is one of my favorite characters in Naruto. This was a tribute for him for his Birthday on December 24, 2009. Some information is actually Canon, but most of what I have written here is mine. Below are some footnotes that might help you understand some things.

(1) _Kusarigama_ is a Japanese word that's literally translated to "chain-sickle". I was inspired to include this when Madara was seen using this in the manga when he was fighting alongside the Kyuubi against the Shodai.

(2 - 3) This little tidbit of information was taken from the manga around the time when the Shodai was first officially introduced along with the backstory of the Clan Wars.

(4 - 7) This piece of information was taken from the Naruto Wiki. I have no idea if this information is actually true or not.

(8) Amaterasu is the name of the Shinto Sun Deity in Japan.

(9) This is in Romaji and it's roughly translated to "I am Madara."


End file.
